Sunday, December 22, 2013

As you can see from the following artist's rendering, Sarah and Piers were successful in their search for a Christmas tree, and we've now got it up and decorated. Note how excited the graduate students are:

The deadline for the Bonnie Wheeler Summer Research Fellowship for 2014
is January 31, 2014. The fellowship is designed to support the research
of women medievalists below the rank of full professor. The $10,000
award is to be used during the
period of June 1–December 31, 2014.

Eligibility: Applicants must be women who hold a Ph.D. in any area of
medieval studies and who are full-time faculty in an academic department
in the U.S. Preference will be given to candidates who are “caught in
the middle” in the promotion ladder, as described
in the MLA report “Standing Still: The Associate Professor Survey.”
Budgets for Fellowship applications should include not only research
costs, but also the costs of freeing up applicants’ time--for example,
relief from summer teaching, daycare and/or eldercare
expenses, and the like. Candidates from previous years are welcome to
reapply.

Mentoring: A special feature of the Fellowship is that it will connect the recipient with a mentor in her scholarly field.

Timetable: The application period is from October 1, 2013 through
January 31, 2014. Completed applications must be received no later than
January 31, 2014. The award will be announced February 28, 2014.

Application Procedure: Please see the Application Instructions on the website (bonniewheelerfund.org) for details.

By way of background, the following appeal came to the Tenants via Jeremy Justus, one of our doctoral alums, who is a colleague of Professor Landrigan. Participation is worth contemplating, if only for the name of the January event alone:

Allow
me to introduce myself: I'm Marissa Landrigan, creative nonfiction
writer and Assistant Professor of Writing at the University of
Pittsburgh - Johnstown, and I'm seeking writers to participate in a new
food-themed reading series I'm curating.

Acquired Taste is a series of public readings in various locations
around Pittsburgh, each featuring 3-4 authors reading their work around a
food-related theme. Our first event will be held at East End Book
Exchange in December, and future events are lining
up at local food shops, bars, music venues, and more.

I'm looking for writers who may be interested in participating in the
series to submit work, most urgently to our upcoming event tentatively
scheduled for January 15th at The Shop (a studio space/music venue in
Bloomfield) on the theme of "Punky Foodster: Readings
on Food, Sex, and Rock and Roll," which will also feature live
performances by several local Pittsburgh bands.

The work may be in any genre -- fiction, nonfiction, journalism, and
poetry are all welcome, but pieces should be around or under 15-20
minutes long. The work may also, of course, have been previously
published, or under consideration for publication.

Themes are meant to be interpreted as broadly or narrowly as each writer likes, and do not need to be taken literally. My
hope is that this will be a playful reading series, one that welcomes
humor, smut, irreverence, etc. One
that makes food tasteful or tasteless. One that engages our audience's
imagination to make them salivate, and to extend our ideas of what "food
writing" looks like.

Please feel free to get in touch with me (mkl18@pitt.edu)
with any questions, submissions (for this or future events), or just to
express interest in being notified about future calls for submission
to the reading series.

Monday, December 2, 2013

Calliope, WVU’s undergraduate literary journal, is now accepting submissions!Are you an aspiring writer, poet, or artist? Would you like to be published in an award-winning journal? If so, then this is for you! Calliope is now accepting submissions in fiction, nonfiction, poetry, and artwork for this year’s edition. Each submission should include your name, major, and MIX email address. Additionally, prose pieces should include a fiction or nonfiction designation. For more information, check us out on Facebook or creativewriting.wvu.edu/calliope. Thanks, and we look forward to seeing your work!

Submission guidelines

Prose2000 words per entry3 entries per personfiction or nonfictionPoetry500 words per entry5 entries per person

Friday, November 29, 2013

2014 Keynote Event

A Conversation with David Henry Hwang

On 4 April 2014, the Comparative Drama
Conference will welcome playwright David Henry Hwang for a stimulating
conversation about contemporary theatre, followed by Q & A with the
audience. Few writers have turned issues around ethnicity and identity
into a widely acclaimed and award-winning career like David Henry Hwang.
The Chinese American playwright, described by the New York Times as "a
true original" and by TIME magazine as "the first important dramatist of American public life since Arthur Miller," is best known as the author of M. Butterfly,
which won a Tony Award, Drama Desk Award, John Gassner Award, and Outer
Critics Circle Award, and was also a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize.
Other plays from his 30 year career include Golden Child (Obie Award, three Tony nominations), Yellow Face (Obie Award, Pulitzer finalist), FOB (Obie Award), and Chinglish (Drama Desk Nomination, named Best New American Play by TIME magazine). Currently, Hwang is the Residency One Playwright at the Signature Theatre in New York City, with a new play, Kung Fu, premiering in May 2014.

2014 Play Event: 7:00 Thursday, April 3

Twelfth Night

By William Shakespeare / Directed by Gavin Witt

Revelry, disguises, swashbuckling, and
(of course) pining lovers abound in what some call Shakespeare’s most
perfect comedy. Twins Viola and Sebastian, separated in a shipwreck and
presuming each other dead, wash ashore in the beautiful but mysterious
land of Illyria. A tale of mistaken identity and mismatched ardor
unfurls as lords and ladies, servants and masters wind a topsy-turvy
path to happiness.

Call for Papers

Submission Deadline: 3 December 2013

Papers reporting on new research and
development in any aspect of drama are invited for the 38th Comparative
Drama Conference hosted by Stevenson University in Baltimore, MD, April
3-5, 2014. Papers may be comparative across nationalities, periods and
disciplines; and may deal with any issue in dramatic literature,
criticism, theory, and performance, or any method of historiography,
translation, or production. Learn More...

38th Comparative Drama Conference

The Comparative Drama Conference is an
international, interdisciplinary conference founded by Dr. Karelisa
Hartigan at the University of Florida in 1977. Every year, approximately
175 scholars are invited to present and discuss their work in the field
of drama. The conference draws participants from both the Humanities
and the Arts. The papers delivered range over the entire field of
theatre research and production. Over the past 37 years, participants
have come from 32 nations and all 50 states. Each year a distinguished
theatre scholar or artist is invited to address the participants in a
plenary session.

Conference Registration

Pre-registration

The 2014 pre-registration fees are valid until February 28, 2014, and are as follows:

The pre-registration fee for
categories 1 – 4 covers all conference events and services, including a
copy of the conference Programs and Abstracts book, a copy of the
current edition of Text and Presentation, admission to all
conference events and the conference reception, and a ticket to a local
performance yet to be determined. One-day passes include conference
admission only (including plenaries and keynote event).Presenters are required to pre-register.
Those whose papers are accepted are expected to attend the conference;
papers are not read in absentia. Submitters of abstracts are also
advised to apply for travel funds from their home institutions as early
as possible. International attendees please visit our website for further instructions.Registration after February 28:
For those who wish to register after February 28 or at the conference,
the fees increase to $109 / $99, $89, $79, and $49. One-day pass fees
remain
the same.

All reservations must be made on an
individual basis by February 28, 2014 to receive the discount. Call
Harbor Magic Hotels at 866-583-4162 to make your reservation. Please be sure to ask for the Comparative Drama Conference discount.

Pre-organized Panels

Pre-organized panels will also be
considered. A pre-organized panel should include three papers. Each
paper should be 15 minutes in length. Learn More...

Plenaries

Each year at the CDC, a major scholar
in drama and/or theatre addresses the conference on a topic of general
interest. The Comparative Drama Conference welcomed Edward Albee, winner
of three Pulitzer Prizes and four Tony Awards, including a Tony for
Lifetime Achievement, as our Keynote Speaker in 2013. The 2012 Keynote
Event was A Conversation with Paula Vogel,
a Q & A session with award-winning playwright and educator Paula Vogel. Learn More...

Staged Readings

The conference board invites
proposals for staged readings of new plays. 2-4 new plays will have
staged readings during the course of the conference. Each staged reading
will also feature a talkback with the audience led by a dramaturg. Learn More...

Text & Presentation

For 31 years, The Comparative Drama
Conference Series has been publishing the best papers presented at its
annual meetings, keeping readers current in scholarship and performance
aesthetics in drama internationally. Learn More...

Constantinidis Award

The Philadelphia Constantinidis Essay
in Critical Theory Award will be given to the best comparative essay on
any aspect and period of Greek drama or theatre that was published in
English in any journal or anthology in any country between January 1 and
December 31 in the prior year. Learn More...

Friday, November 22, 2013

Yet more good news from Colson Hall. Since we couldn't say it better than Katy Ryan, we'll just quote her:

"Congratulations to Yvonne Hammond for passing her booklist exam with intelligence and poise this morning. Amid thoughts of narrative theory, historiography, and performance, Yvonne also conjured Miley Cyrus and MC Hammer. Her committee--Ryan Claycomb, Cari Carpenter, Rosemary Hathaway, John Ernest [of the University of Delaware], me--enjoyed the lively discussion but refrained from dancing in any way whatsoever."

The Tenants are relieved to note that there was no mention of giant teddy bears or twerking and extend Yvonne a hearty congratulations.

On Thursday the
Professional Writing and Editing
(PWE) program hosted the biannual PWE Poster Exhibition. PWE concentrators are
required to complete a capstone
internship in professional or technical communication,
and their posters are an opportunity for them to showcase their work for the
university community. This fall, fourteen students shared posters at the event,
representing a diverse range of internships, from the U.S. Embassy in London to all 55
counties of West Virginia via WVU Extension
Services to the ground floor of Colson Hall and the English department’s
own Center for Literary Computing (CLC).
Interns learned and practiced skills in social media, editing, event planning and marketing,
feature writing, and publishing.

Prizes are awarded for the best posters, and this semester
the top prize went to Beth Warnick for her poster "Independent Contracting
in the Professional Field: The Many Jobs of a Single Writer in Academia,"
which showcased her work for the WVU
religious studies program.

Second prize went to Melissa Yost for her poster “Summer Abroad:
Editor at the U.S. Embassy in London, England.”

Third prize went to Lisa Romeo for her poster “My Internship
as a Contributing Writer & Social Media Intern with My MorgantowneMagazine.”

Congratulations to all of the interns on their
accomplishments this term, including:

Emilee White, who interned with
Trillium Performing Arts Collective and The Lewis Theatre in
Lewisburg, WV. She worked on promotions for theater events, press releases, and
a Kickstarter campaign that was successful in raising “39K in 39 Days” to
purchase a new digital projector for the historic Lewis Theatre.

Keelin McGill, who interned with the
CLC and contributed comprehensive editing
and digital formatting skills to the Electronic Book Review.

Amy Marino, who interned with
Forever 21, working on internal communication including a weekly employee
newsletter, manager communication logs, posters, and a new-hire interview
policy.

Zachary Wied, who interned with Eventstyle in New York, using various
social media platforms to connect with multiple audiences for multiple purposes,
from current and prospective clients to vendors.

Kate Murphy, who interned with the
Eberly College’s Office
of Marketing and Communications, conducting interviews, updating web
content, and writing feature articles. Her poster highlighted the transfer of
these skills to her current full-time position in property management.

Kassandra Roberts, who interned with
the CLC, editing, indexing, formatting, and
proofreading PO.EX, a collection of
essays from Portugal.

Thank you to everyone who supported these talented English
majors by attending the poster exhibit, especially the three graduate students (Natalie
Carpini, Sara Ash, and Jay Kirby) who performed the difficult task of evaluating
and narrowing down the top three poster presenters.

Wednesday, November 13, 2013

It's been a busy day in Colson Hall. During the morning, Jericho Williams impressed his booklist committee--Tim Sweet (Chair), Katy Ryan, Brian Ballentine, Lowell Duckert, and Tom Kinnahan of Duquesne University--and successfully passed his Qualifying Exam for Doctoral Candidacy. Not to be outdone, in the afternoon Sreya Chatterjee had a similar chat with her committee--Lisa Weihman (Chair), Gwen Bergner, Marilyn Francus, Ann Oberhauser (who stopped by from the Geography Department), and yours truly--who also felt she was more than ready to move on with her degree. Both Jericho and Sreya are thus now ABD, and the Tenants extend a hearty congratulations to both of them.

“In the crowd the individual feels that he is transcending the
limits of his own person.” – Elias Canetti

There is no community of writers using digital media but there is a crowd of
writers on the surface of media. Writers using digital media have nothing in
common, they are indifferent to and negate all difference of others in the
crowd, and they relate through the fact of writing in and with a medium. Such
writers are social, mobile, and ubiquitous, and such crowds possess the power
of globalized, neoliberal, media systems. Considerable recent scholarly work
seeks to map and understand the formation and dynamics of electronic literature
communities. Such work in fact describes crowds of writers with great power and
potential. Such crowds model invention through writing. The best-known example,
the European ELMCIP project, uses electronic literature as a “model of
creativity in practice,” where networks of writers and readers can scale to
other communities and actor-networks of practice. Yet it is the “love of
literature” that makes this crowd a community after all: a community not
of social, mobile, and ubiquitous media but of the asocial, the immobile, and
the singular. Elit is literature because (in as far as) its failure (refusal?)
as a product of global, neoliberal, media systems. In this talk I will examine
current research on elit communities. I will re-situate that work in terms of
the power of crowds writing on the surface of media. I conclude by discussing
the conditions and possibility for a literary community in the elit crowd.

This
pedagogy course provides teaching strategies drawn from current
research on college education. Students will practice and apply these
teaching skills in their own disciplines
in order to become effective college instructors.

The
Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL) is a growing movement in
higher education to conduct scholarly research on learning and inform
teaching. Students will learn strategies
for combining effective teaching with research and explore SoLT
opportunities within their field. Students in the Certificate should
enroll in this course twice: first in the fall, then in the spring.

Instructor: Dr. Amy L. Kuhn.

GRAD 685: Teaching Capstone 3 Credits, CRN 15901, Online

This
is the capstone course for the Certificate in University Teaching and
is intended to help students design a course in their interest area,
design an effective teaching portfolio,
and prepare for the academic job search.

Monday, November 4, 2013

A former United States ambassador and the former director of
program development for the American Refugee Committee International headline "Extending
a Hand: Personal, Literary, Historical, and Political Perspectives on U.S. Efforts
to Aid the Developing World,” a panel to be held Wednesday, November 13th,
at 7:30 p.m. in the Rhododendron Room of the Mountainlair.

In addition to examining the role of the United States in
developing nations, the panel will offer WVU students who are interested in
living and working abroad insight into how to pursue international careers.

The panel is free and open to the public. Refreshments will
be served.

Panelists are former U.S. Ambassador to Senegal Dane Smith and his wife, Judy
Smith, a docent at the Museum of African Art; Connie Kamara, director of Health
and Wellness Services at Winona State University, who is a former director of
program development for the American Refugee Committee International; and
Joshuah Marshall, an impact evaluator at the Administration for Native
Americans (ANA) and a former Peace Corps Volunteer who served in Morocco and
recently received the Franklin H. Williams Award, given to ethnically diverse
returned Peace Corps Volunteers who exemplify a commitment to community
service.

The panel will be moderated by Mark Brazaitis, a WVU English
professor who has worked as a Peace Corps Volunteer and a Peace Corps Technical
Trainer in Guatemala and as a U.S. AID contractor in Mexico and has written
novels, short stories, essays, and poems about his experiences abroad. His
latest book, Julia & Rodrigo,
winner of the 2012 Gival Press Novel Award, is a Romeo-and-Juliet story set
during the Guatemalan civil war.

“It’s exciting to be able to bring to WVU dynamic panelists
with a wide-range of experiences in the developing world,” Brazaitis said. “I
know they will have excellent advice for WVU students who are interested in
working in developing countries.”

The panel is funded by the James and Arthur Gabriel/Gabriel
Brothers Inc. Faculty Award. Brazaitis was one of three 2013 recipients. The
award, established by James and Arthur Gabriel, the founding partners of
Gabriel Brothers Inc., was created to promote and support faculty members in their
projects associated with American culture and society.

Thursday, October 31, 2013

There was a lot of noise coming from 106 Colson yesterday afternoon, which considerably alarmed the staff, but it turned out just to be Dibs Roy recreating the hypermasculine ideology of the atomic bomb, including an enactment of a scenario of mutually assured nuclear destruction, for the benefit of his exam committee: Sandy Baldwin (Chair), Brian Ballentine, Ryan Claycomb, Patrick Sharp of Cal State (who was able to watch the whole thing from a safe distance via Skype), and yours truly. In the aftermath, the committee unanimously agreed the Dibs had passed his Qualifying Exam for Doctoral Candidacy and that he was now Dibs Roy, ABD. Congratulations, Dibs.

Monday, October 28, 2013

This past Friday, the editors, staff, and friends of our online literary journal, Cheat River Review, gathered to celebrate the launch of the inaugural issue. The photos are not the best—sorry about that—but everyone worked so hard, that pics are required, even if some of them are blurry.

Here's editor-in-chief Patric Nuttall telling us that the issue "dropped" that day and showing us around the website. As he said, "check out our blog... it's pretty sweet."

We also heard selections from the journal... read by fiction editor Mari Casey (in costume, for this was a Halloween party too)...

and nonfiction editor Sadie Shorr-Parks (dressed as "the old country" and wearing "all the babushkas" her grandma left behind when she moved to Florida).

We also ate Dirty Bird chicken (actual quote from Glenn Taylor who really should be their spokesman: "God, I love this chicken."), and the post-launch festivities included more discussion of costumes and, believe it or not, the playing of board games.

Yep. That's how we roll in creative writing. In the now-famous words of Patric Nuttall, it's pretty sweet.

Friday, October 25, 2013

Last night Sigma Tau Delta, the English honorary, had its annual induction ceremony. Department Chair Jim Harms sent along these pics of the impressively large group of students and of the ever-lovely E. Moore Hall.

That's such a tranquil blue on the walls, don't you think?

That's Sigma Tau Delta President Ken Heitmeyer at the podium in those first two pics. Special thanks to him for all his work on this event. And special thanks to faculty advisor Anna Elfenbein. Anna, why are you not in these photos? Event planning is one of Anna's talents, and I'm quite sure last night's ceremony was an elegant celebration thanks to her.

Thursday, October 24, 2013

When you come to The Gathering next week, you'll see that we've finally brightened the place up with some poems and art by middle schoolers from Putnam and Preston counties. These pieces were the result of workshops sponsored by McGraw-Hill/CTB. We hope you enjoy the work of these young artists and writers. Actually, we know you will, and we think you'll be impressed, too.

Tuesday, October 22, 2013

The Department of English at West Virginia University is
excited to announce its Second English Gathering, beginning at 5:30 p.m. on
Friday, November 1 in Colson Hall on the downtown campus.The event is part of WVU’s Mountaineer Week.

The Gathering is an opportunity for graduates and former
faculty of the department to convene in celebration of all things
literary.Current students in the
department’s four graduate programs (PhD, MFA, MAPWE and MA) will give informal
talks on their research, creative writing and teaching practices, and guests
will have the opportunity to roam the halls of historic Colson Hall and meet
with current and former faculty and students.

A celebratory wine and hors d’oeuvre reception will begin at
6:00, to be followed by a special program in honor and memory of the
distinguished West Virginia poet Tom Andrews.The program will feature readings of Andrews’ poems, a personal
reflection on his life by Creative Writing Program Director Mary Ann Samyn, and
a talk by the distinguished poet, translator, scholar and editor David Young,
who is Longman Professor of English at Oberlin College.Professor Young is the author of countless
books of poetry, translation, nonfiction and criticism, including most
recently, Moon Woke Me Up Nine
Times:Selected Haiku of Basho (Knopf,
2013), and Field of Light and
Shadow:Selected and New Poems (Knopf,
2010).

A special announcement will conclude the celebratory event.

The Second English Gathering is free and open to the
public.A book signing will follow.

Monday, October 21, 2013

Please join us for the 2013 Neil S. Bucklew Lecture on Higher Education Administration, featuring Dr. Christopher
B. Howard, president of Hampden-Sydney College. Dr. Howard's talk will take place
Tuesday, October 22 at 1:00 p.m. at The Erickson Alumni Center.
One of the youngest college presidents in the nation, Dr. Howard is a
rising star in higher education leadership. He graduated with
distinction from the U.S. Air Force Academy, was a Rhodes
Scholar and earned a doctorate in politics at Oxford University and an
MBA from the Harvard Business School.

This workshop
will discuss how to prepare and present
your scientific poster presentation. Topics will include poster content
evaluation and organization, artistic design, oral presentation, how to
avoid common mistakes, title creation, and winning a national
competition. Previously used posters will be used
for critique. All participants will receive a Do's and Don'ts Guide to
Scientific Poster Presentation that includes a checklist and essential
tips to success. Participants are encouraged to bring a copy of their
own poster for review.

October 24, 2-3pm Evansdale Library Room 130

Teaching in Large Group Lecture Classes

Presenter:
Dr. Mark Paternostro

Presentation will offer practical take-home strategies for creating engaging, interactive large group lectures.

October 28, 6-7pm Oglebay Hall Room 107

Becoming a Teaching Professor: PROS and CONS

Presenter:
Dr. Lizzie Santiago

More
universities are hiring faculty as "teaching professors" or full-time
"lecturers." These faculty have
higher teaching loads and lower research commitments than traditional
tenure-track faculty at research universities. Come and learn about the
career path of a Teaching Assistant Professor at WVU to learn more about
this potential career.